Piastri extends Lusail mastery with stunning Qatar pole position

Hours after dominating the Sprint Race, the Australian edged past Norris to claim his sixth pole of 2025 and his first since August, topping the timesheets with a new lap record of 1m19.387s.

Norris had briefly looked like he would take the edge in Q3 with a provisional pole of 1m19.495s, but the Brit could not improve after running wide on his final push lap and aborting it, failing to reach the line in time for another attempt.

Piastri capitalised, clawing back time he had seemingly lost to his teammate in the opening sector, giving him a crucial advantage heading into the race as he looks to further dig into his teammate’s championship lead, having taken two crucial points earlier in the Sprint to reduce the gap to 22 points.

Max Verstappen impressed on his final push, bettering Piastri’s opening sector, but ultimately fell short by two tenths and will start third behind the two title rivals.

The Dutchman narrowly beat the Mercedes duo of George Russell and Kimi Antonelli, both of whom looked capable of mounting a pole challenge but ultimately fell short.

At the top of the timesheets, Piastri said he was delighted with his lap, noting that minimal changes had been made to the car since the Sprint.

“We left it pretty much the same,” he admitted.

“A few minor tweaks here and there. Everything felt great all weekend, so yeah, if it ain’t broke don’t fix it.”

He added that tyre selection proved tricky in the session.

“[We] had a little question mark on which tyres we wanted to use.

“I did a quick lap on the used set in Q2 and yeah, that threw a little bit of a spanner in the works as we didn’t expect it to be so good,” he said.

“But no, Q3 was really good on the new set. Very happy.”

 

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Norris, who can secure the championship with a win tomorrow, said he was satisfied with second despite his aborted final lap.

“I just got a bit of understeer and was going to go off so I had to abort, which is a shame but that’s the way it is,” he explained.

“Oscar did a good lap and drove very well and has been driving well all weekend.

“So yeah, nothing to complain about, just didn’t do the lap, and yeah, still P2 for tomorrow.”

Verstappen admitted his car felt better in qualifying after struggles with excessive porpoising over the weekend.

“I think this qualifying was a little bit better, even though of course we are still though quite far off,” he said.

“At least I felt a little bit happier, but still some limitations that don’t allow us to push harder around the lap.

“But I think at least we are P3 and yeah we are, starting on the second row.”

He added that although the weekend had been challenging, he hoped to make progress in the race despite Lusail being a difficult circuit for overtaking.

“It creates the better opportunities let’s say like that, because we know it’s quite hard to pass around here,” he said.

“Realistically it’s a bit tough this weekend. Just not been what I wanted it to be so far.

“But we’ll see what we can do tomorrow.”

Q3 was briefly red-flagged at the halfway point to clear gravel and debris. Charles Leclerc triggered the pause with an aggressive spin on his first push lap, scattering gravel across the track.

Carlos Sainz also left debris in unusual fashion after exiting his pit box with tyre stickers stuck to his tyres from the pit-box floor. One eventually peeled off onto the circuit, prompting an FIA investigation for an unsafe release.

Leclerc’s spin compounded a difficult weekend, with the Ferrari driver ending the session in 10th, while Sainz finished slightly higher in seventh.

Isack Hadjar continued his strong run in 2025, finishing in the top 10 for the fourth consecutive race and lining up sixth, with Fernando Alonso eighth and Pierre Gasly ninth, impressing for Alpine.

Q2 was briefly delayed to clear gravel at Turn 15, a concern after Pirelli confirmed several tyres had suffered “deep cuts” from cars running wide.

The pause did not disrupt Piastri, who became the first driver to break 1m20s at Lusail as he topped the session.

Norris faced a tense moment when his banker lap was deleted for track limits at Turn 10 but comfortably progressed on his final run. Nico Hulkenberg, Liam Lawson, Oliver Bearman, Gabriel Bortoleto, and Alex Albon were eliminated.

Lawson narrowly missed Q3, finishing just seven hundredths behind teammate Hadjar, while Bortoleto will start 19th after a five-place penalty for his Turn 1 crash in Las Vegas last weekend.

Q1 had already seen drivers pushing the limits, with several — including Norris again — losing lap times for track-limit breaches.

As in Q2, Norris was never in danger, ending the session second, but Lewis Hamilton suffered another early exit, eliminated in Q1 for the second race in a row — and for the third qualifying session running after his SQ1 departure yesterday.

The seven-time world champion cut a forlorn figure, finishing 18th, two tenths outside the cut-off in a session where the top 19 were covered by less than a second.

Yuki Tsunoda also missed out, ending two spots ahead of Hamilton in 16th and falling short of Q2 by seven hundredths. Esteban Ocon’s Haas split Tsunoda and Hamilton, while Lance Stroll and Franco Colapinto also dropped out in the opening phase.

The Qatar Grand Prix begins at 7pm Sunday local time (3am AEDT Monday).